Great Buddha of Kamakura: The Bronze Amida Buddha (1252)

The Great Buddha of Kamakura (Kamakura Daibutsu) is a monumental bronze statue of Amida Buddha at Kōtoku-in temple in Kamakura, Japan. Casting began in 1252, when Kamakura was the seat of Japan’s first warrior government. Standing in the open air since its hall was destroyed by storms and, according to tradition, a tsunami, it is one of the most famous images of Japan and a National Treasure.

Background: Kamakura and Pure Land Buddhism

In 1185 Minamoto no Yoritomo established a military government in the small coastal town of Kamakura, as described in the article on the founding of the Kamakura shogunate. Over the following decades Kamakura grew into a political and religious centre to rival the imperial capital of Kyoto, with major temples and shrines.

At the same time, Pure Land Buddhism was spreading rapidly among both warriors and ordinary people. Its teachers, such as Hōnen (1133-1212), taught that faith in Amida Buddha and the recitation of his name could bring rebirth in his Pure Land, a paradise in the west. A giant image of Amida was a natural object of devotion for this movement. The model of a monumental bronze Buddha already existed in the Great Buddha of Tōdai-ji in Nara, cast in the 8th century and rebuilt after a fire in 1180.

The wooden Buddha and the bronze Buddha

The Azuma Kagami, the official chronicle of the Kamakura shogunate, is the main written source. It records that a wooden statue of the Great Buddha was begun in 1238 and dedicated in 1243, the result of a fundraising campaign led by a priest called Jōkō, who collected donations across eastern Japan. Later tradition also credits a court lady, Inada no Tsubone, with supporting the project. The fate of the wooden statue is uncertain; it may have been damaged by a storm.

The chronicle then records that the casting of a bronze Great Buddha began in 1252. Curiously, the Azuma Kagami describes it as an image of Shaka (the historical Buddha), whereas the statue that survives is clearly Amida; historians usually treat this as an error or inconsistency in the chronicle. Later accounts name the casters as Ōno Gorōemon and Tanji Hisatomo, although the evidence for these names is late. The exact date of completion is not known, but the statue and a great hall around it were probably finished within a few years.

How the statue was made

The Great Buddha is about 11.3 metres tall, or about 13.4 metres with its base, and weighs around 121 tonnes. It was cast in place in a series of horizontal sections, probably more than thirty pours of molten bronze, each joined to the one below. The seams, and the methods used to lock the sections together, can still be seen from inside the hollow statue.

Traces of gold leaf on the cheek show that the statue was once gilded. The Buddha sits in the lotus position with his hands resting in his lap in the meditation gesture, his thumbs touching. Art historians note that the head is slightly enlarged and tilted forward, so that the statue looks well proportioned to a worshipper standing in front of it. Its calm, rounded face reflects the realistic style of Kamakura-period sculpture, influenced by Song dynasty Chinese art.

The loss of the hall and later restoration

The statue was originally housed in a large wooden hall, whose foundation stones survive around it. According to records, the hall was damaged or destroyed by storms in 1334 and 1369. Tradition holds that the rebuilt hall was swept away by the tsunami that followed the great Meiō earthquake of September 1498, which struck the Pacific coast of central Japan. Some historians think the hall may already have been gone by then, but since at least the late 15th century the Buddha has stood in the open air.

For more than two centuries the statue was neglected. In the early 18th century the priest Yūten and a wealthy Edo merchant raised funds to repair it, and the Jōdo school temple of Kōtoku-in was established to look after it.

The Great Kantō earthquake of 1 September 1923 damaged the Buddha’s base and shifted the statue, but the bronze survived; it was repaired by 1925. Between 1959 and 1961 a major restoration strengthened the neck and installed a base designed to allow the statue to slide slightly during an earthquake, an early form of seismic isolation. The statue was designated a National Treasure in 1958. Further conservation work in 2016 cleaned and inspected the bronze.

Legacy

Kamakura itself declined after the fall of the shogunate in 1333, although it remained an important religious centre under the later Ashikaga regime. In the Edo period (1603-1868) the Great Buddha became a stop for pilgrims and travellers visiting Kamakura and the nearby island of Enoshima, and woodblock prints and guidebooks spread its image across Japan.

The statue is also a valuable record of medieval technology. Studies of the bronze and of the casting joints have helped historians understand how Japanese founders of the 13th century handled such large amounts of metal, and comparison with the Tōdai-ji Buddha, repaired and recast after the fire of 1180, shows how the craft of large-scale casting was practised in this period.

By the late 19th century the Great Buddha had become one of Japan’s best-known sights for foreign visitors and was widely photographed. Rudyard Kipling, who visited in 1889 and 1892, wrote the poem “The Buddha at Kamakura”, which helped make the statue famous in the English-speaking world.

The Buddha survived the Mongol invasions of Japan, the fall of the Kamakura shogunate in 1333 and centuries of earthquakes and storms. Today it draws millions of visitors and remains an active place of worship.

Key people

• Jōkō: priest who led the fundraising for the first, wooden Great Buddha in the 1230s and 1240s.
• Inada no Tsubone: court lady traditionally said to have supported the project.
• Ōno Gorōemon and Tanji Hisatomo: casters traditionally credited with the bronze statue.
• Yūten: priest who led the early 18th-century restoration.

Myths and facts

• Myth: the Great Buddha has always stood outdoors. Fact: it was designed to sit inside a great wooden hall, and the stone bases of that hall’s pillars can still be seen.
• Myth: the statue represents the historical Buddha, Shakyamuni. Fact: it represents Amida, the Buddha of the Pure Land, even though the Azuma Kagami’s entry for 1252 calls the bronze image Shaka.
• Myth: the 1498 tsunami certainly destroyed the hall. Fact: it is the traditional explanation and is plausible, as the temple stands only about a kilometre from the sea, but historians debate the details.

By the numbers

Timeline

• 1185: The Kamakura shogunate is established.
• 1238: Work on a wooden Great Buddha begins.
• 1243: The wooden Buddha is dedicated.
• 1252: Casting of the bronze Amida Buddha begins.
• 1334 and 1369: Storms damage the Great Buddha’s hall.
• 1498, September: The Meiō earthquake and tsunami; by tradition the hall is destroyed.
• 1923, 1 September: The Great Kantō earthquake damages the base.
• 1958: The statue is designated a National Treasure.
• 1959-1961: Restoration adds a base with seismic protection.

Why it matters

The Great Buddha of Kamakura is a masterpiece of medieval Japanese bronze casting and a symbol of the Pure Land faith that spread widely in the Kamakura period. Having survived the loss of its hall and centuries of natural disasters, it has become one of the most recognisable images of Japanese culture.